The Problem With Evolution- Part 1, Ape to Man Ridiculousness

[The Barbarian]

3 hours ago, Sparks said:

We don't have a common descendant.

Genetics says we do.   Not evolutionary theory.    And we can test that finding by looking at the DNA of organisms of known descent.

3 hours ago, Sparks said:

I mean no offense, but I have never met anyone as deceived as you concerning evolution. 

You have a lot of strongly-reinforced misconceptions.   So it's not surprising that the first time you encounter facts, that you just can't deal with them.    I've spent a lifetime studying biology, and no, "they are all lying!" will not counter a lifetime of investigation and fact.

3 hours ago, Sparks said:

Your side says we all came from a fossilized Saccorhytus Coronarius

Actually, it would be remarkable if any particular fossil happened to be the one on the line that led to humans.    In particular, it seems that S. coronarius (species name is never capitalized) was not a deuterostome and hence not even close to our ancestral line.   Interestingly, Conway Morris, who first suggested that it might be so, is a Christian, a believer of the literal death and resurrection of Jesus as man and as God.

But the pores on the animal, which initially looked like primitive gill openings, turned out to be damage from pulled out spines.    So the Ur-deuterostome remains to be found.  

3 hours ago, Sparks said:

I cannot take your evolution arguments seriously. 

That is precisely what's hurting you in this discussion.    It won't take your salvation away if you're a YE creationist.   But anyone who makes an idol of his opinions on evolution or creationism is putting his salvation at risk.

"The first thing a cult does is tell you that everyone else is lying." - Unknown

Are you familiar with C.S. Lewis?    I would recommend that you read Mere Christianity, a work in which he lays out a rational Christian perspective.   There's not much, if anything, of evolution therein,but he espouses a practical Christian outlook that many scientists, including myself, find compelling.   I knew Francis Collins was one, but it turns out that Conway Morris is also one.  

Would you consider reading it, if you haven't done so already?    I would like to discuss that with you; it could be a way out of this impasse.

 

[Sparks]

14 hours ago, The Barbarian said:

Genetics says we do.   Not evolutionary theory.    And we can test that finding by looking at the DNA of organisms of known descent.

You have a lot of strongly-reinforced misconceptions.   So it's not surprising that the first time you encounter facts, that you just can't deal with them.    I've spent a lifetime studying biology, and no, "they are all lying!" will not counter a lifetime of investigation and fact.

Actually, it would be remarkable if any particular fossil happened to be the one on the line that led to humans.    In particular, it seems that S. coronarius (species name is never capitalized) was not a deuterostome and hence not even close to our ancestral line.   Interestingly, Conway Morris, who first suggested that it might be so, is a Christian, a believer of the literal death and resurrection of Jesus as man and as God.

But the pores on the animal, which initially looked like primitive gill openings, turned out to be damage from pulled out spines.    So the Ur-deuterostome remains to be found.  

That is precisely what's hurting you in this discussion.    It won't take your salvation away if you're a YE creationist.   But anyone who makes an idol of his opinions on evolution or creationism is putting his salvation at risk.

"The first thing a cult does is tell you that everyone else is lying." - Unknown

Are you familiar with C.S. Lewis?    I would recommend that you read Mere Christianity, a work in which he lays out a rational Christian perspective.   There's not much, if anything, of evolution therein,but he espouses a practical Christian outlook that many scientists, including myself, find compelling.   I knew Francis Collins was one, but it turns out that Conway Morris is also one.  

Would you consider reading it, if you haven't done so already?    I would like to discuss that with you; it could be a way out of this impasse.

We don't agree on anything.  I am not an evolutionist, let alone one who thinks God used evolution, not a Catholic, not an mRNA vaccine supporter, and I don't think that every answer a government agency gives is the truth. 

I often wonder if you are paid to be here to object to anything anyone posts.

[The Barbarian]

1 hour ago, Sparks said:

We don't agree on anything.  I am not an evolutionist, let alone one who thinks God used evolution, not a Catholic, not an mRNA vaccine supporter, and I don't think that every answer a government agency gives is the truth. 

Well, we agree on the last one, anyway.   But would you be willing at least to read C.S.Lewis' Mere Christianity?   It's not a trap.   Lewis was ambivalent on evolution, and I don't remember him saying anything about it in that book.  It's been responsible for bringing many skeptical people to Christ.

Worth a read?

1 hour ago, Sparks said:

I often wonder if you are paid to be here to object to anything anyone posts.

I would think a professional would do a much better job of writing than I do.  My forte is technical writing and research reports.    So, as you probably noticed, I'm a bit dry sometimes.

[The Barbarian]

 But there is a difficulty about disagreeing with God. He is the source from which all your reasoning power comes: you could not be right and He wrong any more than a stream can rise higher than its own source. When you are arguing against Him you are arguing against the very power that makes you able to argue at all: it is like cutting off the branch you are sitting on.

C.S. Lewis, Mere Christianity

[Sparks]

1 hour ago, The Barbarian said:

Well, we agree on the last one, anyway.   But would you be willing at least to read C.S.Lewis' Mere Christianity?   It's not a trap.   Lewis was ambivalent on evolution, and I don't remember him saying anything about it in that book.  It's been responsible for bringing many skeptical people to Christ.

Worth a read?

I would think a professional would do a much better job of writing than I do.  My forte is technical writing and research reports.    So, as you probably noticed, I'm a bit dry sometimes.

C.S. Lewis is one of the best communicators ever, and I have read Mere Christianity.  He was an Anglican, though, and I don't agree with how claim they arrive at the state of salvation.  The Episcopalians are effectively Anglican's, so I don't agree with them either, nor how the Catholics claim they arrive at Salvation, nor the Orthodox groups.  I think you will find that just about any protestant would disagree with their teachings.

As for agreeing with me about government, I have never seen you say the CDC or FDA or any of those alphabet soup agencies was ever wrong about vaccines, or anything else.  If they publish it, you seem to automatically agree.

[The Barbarian]

6 minutes ago, Sparks said:

C.S. Lewis is one of the best communicators ever, and I have read Mere Christianity.  He was an Anglican, though, and I don't agree with how claim they arrive at the state of salvation.  The Episcopalians are effectively Anglican's, so I don't agree with them either, nor how the Catholics claim they arrive at Salvation, nor the Orthodox groups.  I think you will find that just about any protestant would disagree with their teachings.

You do realize that Protestants are no less Christians than apostolic churches, right?   So long as you accept the Apostle's Creed, or a statement of faith expressing the same beliefs, you're a traditional Christian.

I'm aware that some in the Protestant tradition do not, but as The Church says, we don't deny anything that is true and holy in other faiths.    It doesn't mean you aren't going to be saved.

10 minutes ago, Sparks said:

As for agreeing with me about government, I have never seen you say the CDC or FDA or any of those alphabet soup agencies was ever wrong about vaccines

Well, I've done graduate work in immunology and I have degrees in biological sciences, so I happen to know about the issue.   And as events proved, the vaccines were quite effective at preventing severe illness and death.    In fact, they were better than most at preventing infection entirely.

The salient failure of the FDA was the way they failed to prevent the opioid crisis.   They were far too willing to accept the word of a certain family running a drug company, and it resulted in deaths and addiction.

To be fair to Trump, the crisis didn't start on his watch.    The huge increase in prescriptions for opiods began about 2013.    But he bungled the chance to fix it quickly:

One of the longest struggles occurred within the office charged with serving as the liaison between the White House and agencies on drug-related issues, the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy. The office ran without a confirmed director for Trump’s first two years in office, and Trump’s first nominee to lead the office, Pennsylvania Republican Rep. Tom Marino, withdrew his nomination after reporting revealed that he’d taken nearly $100,000 from the pharmaceutical lobby while sponsoring a bill that made it easier for drug companies to distribute opioids across American communities and thwart the Drug Enforcement Agency.

And while the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy was being run by a career official, one of the highest ranked staffers the Trump administration installed into the office was a 24-year-old former campaign worker with no previous drug policy experience.

https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/02/politics/opioid-epidemic-donald-trump-drug-policy/index.html

Obama's FDA director was remiss in not taking action earlier.  

https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2019/national/fentanyl-epidemic-obama-administration/

They were wrong about opiods, at a critical time.   But they were right about the vaccines.    Again, to be fair, it was one of Trump's important successes that he pushed for a rapid vaccine development.   

 

 

[Sparks]

1 hour ago, The Barbarian said:

Well, I've done graduate work in immunology and I have degrees in biological sciences, so I happen to know about the issue.   And as events proved, the vaccines were quite effective at preventing severe illness and death.    In fact, they were better than most at preventing infection entirely.

The vaccines did kill a lot of people.  Last November, or so, some high level guy in New Zealand who worked at the Ministry of Health crunched the numbers to find that 1 in 1000 were killed by the vaccines there, and since it is the same vaccines, to port those numbers over means the vaccines killed 17 to 23 million people total (Moderna and Pfizer) anywhere they were used world-wide.  Though the math is irrefutable, and you can do your own math with the numbers they published, I doubt you will agree with the conclusions and the governments and the drug companies have no comment.  They literally don't want to see the data, and all media outlets are quiet.

The Catholics, Anglicans, Episcopalians and Orthodox have very different beliefs about how to arrive at salvation than the protestants.  We are all just as 'Christian' I guess, but I have written a post long ago how the term Christian has come to mean anything you want it to mean, so I use the term disciple to describe those who follow Jesus.  For those who have accepted the gift of salvation, I use the term Born Again and Saved.  

You will find that Bible mentions the word Christian(s) only three times (KJV) and of those times mentioned, it is more about what others called us, in a sentence, than lessons.  There are no instructions on how to be a Christian in the Bible, but the Bible is packed with life's instructions you can use as a disciple of Christ.

[The Barbarian]

6 hours ago, Sparks said:

The vaccines did kill a lot of people.  Last November, or so, some high level guy in New Zealand who worked at the Ministry of Health crunched the numbers to find that 1 in 1000 were killed by the vaccines there

Checkable source?   There were a lot of faked stories like that.   Show us what you have.

Fact check: False claim COVID-19 vaccines caused 1.1 million deaths

Since COVID-19 vaccines first became available in late 2020, vaccine skeptics have twisted public health data to say the vaccines are actually harmful to recipients.

One such claim comes from a Nov. 24 article from The Expose, a website that has published multiple pieces of misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines.

“Secret CDC Report reveals at least 1.1 Million Americans have 'Died Suddenly' since the COVID Vaccine roll-out & another Government Report proves the COVID Vaccines are to blame,” reads the article's headline.

The piece was shared more than 700 times on Facebook in a month, according to the social media analytics tool CrowdTangle.

But the article is incorrect. The data source it cites does not list any cause for reported excess deaths in the U.S. Experts say COVID-19 infections make up most of those deaths.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2022/12/23/fact-check-false-claim-covid-19-vaccines-caused-1-1-million-deaths/10929679002/

In fact, those guys used deaths caused by suicides, auto accidents, and in one case an "adverse event" of becoming the Incredible Hulk as caused by COVID-19 vaccines.

 

Claims that millions of people have died from the COVID-19 vaccine are unfounded

The claim is based on a misreading of sources that include the U.S.'s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System and Europe’s EudraVigilance databases.

https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2021/claims-that-millions-of-people-have-died-from-the-covid-19-vaccine-are-unfounded/

It's not just the fact that anti-vaxxers have been repeatedly caught peddling these hoaxes.   Many of them are profoundly ignorant of the way different RNAs work, and often confuse them with DNA or t-RNA or even ribosomes.  It's the blind misleading the blind.

To anyone who has actually worked with immune processes, it's funny and pathetic at the same time.

 

Edited January 15 by The Barbarian

[The Barbarian]

6 hours ago, Sparks said:

Though the math is irrefutable,

Math isn't evidence.   Show us the data.   Then we'll take a look.   As you see, those guys programming you have been caught lying repeatedly.

6 hours ago, Sparks said:

The Catholics, Anglicans, Episcopalians and Orthodox have very different beliefs about how to arrive at salvation than the protestants. 

We think Jesus had it right:
Matthew 7:21 Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
 

Matthew 22:36 Master, which is the greatest commandment in the law?  37 Jesus said to him: Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with thy whole heart, and with thy whole soul, and with thy whole mind.  38 This is the greatest and the first commandment.  39 And the second is like to this: Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself.  40 On these two commandments dependeth the whole law and the prophets.

Get those right, and you're going to be saved, if you believe Jesus.

6 hours ago, Sparks said:

There are no instructions on how to be a Christian in the Bible

See above.   I believe Jesus.   Everyone should believe Him.

 

[Sparks]

1 hour ago, The Barbarian said:

Checkable source?   There were a lot of faked stories like that.   Show us what you have.

Fact check: False claim COVID-19 vaccines caused 1.1 million deaths

Since COVID-19 vaccines first became available in late 2020, vaccine skeptics have twisted public health data to say the vaccines are actually harmful to recipients.

One such claim comes from a Nov. 24 article from The Expose, a website that has published multiple pieces of misinformation about COVID-19 vaccines.

“Secret CDC Report reveals at least 1.1 Million Americans have 'Died Suddenly' since the COVID Vaccine roll-out & another Government Report proves the COVID Vaccines are to blame,” reads the article's headline.

The piece was shared more than 700 times on Facebook in a month, according to the social media analytics tool CrowdTangle.

But the article is incorrect. The data source it cites does not list any cause for reported excess deaths in the U.S. Experts say COVID-19 infections make up most of those deaths.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/factcheck/2022/12/23/fact-check-false-claim-covid-19-vaccines-caused-1-1-million-deaths/10929679002/

In fact, those guys used deaths caused by suicides, auto accidents, and in one case an "adverse event" of becoming the Incredible Hulk as caused by COVID-19 vaccines.

 

Claims that millions of people have died from the COVID-19 vaccine are unfounded

The claim is based on a misreading of sources that include the U.S.'s Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System and Europe’s EudraVigilance databases.

https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2021/claims-that-millions-of-people-have-died-from-the-covid-19-vaccine-are-unfounded/

It's not just the fact that anti-vaxxers have been repeatedly caught peddling these hoaxes.   Many of them are profoundly ignorant of the way different RNAs work, and often confuse them with DNA or t-RNA or even ribosomes.  It's the blind misleading the blind.

To anyone who has actually worked with immune processes, it's funny and pathetic at the same time.

You always run to the government and the press to 'fact check' but you didn't fact check.  Look for yourself every once in a while, instead of government and the press.

Thanks for making my case.